PON T IFICIA UN IVERS I T AS L ATER ANEN S I S

ACA DEMIA ALFO NSIANA

INSTITUTUM SUPERIUS THEOLOGIAE MORALIS

STUDIA MORALIA

VII

1969

CONTRIBUTIONES AD PROBLEMA SPEI

DESCLÉE & SOCII - EDITORES PONTIFICII

ROM A - P A RIS - T OU RN AI - NEW YO RK

PONTIFICIA UNIVERSITAS LATERANENSI3

A CADE MIA ALFONSIANA

INSTITUTUM SUPERIUS TIIEOLOGIAE MORALIS

STUDIA l\10RALIA

VII

1 9 6 9

CONTRIBUTIONES AD PROBLEMA SPEI

DESCLÉE & SOCII • EDITORES PONTIFICrI

RO,!A PAR I S TOURNAI NEW YORK

Imprimi poteBt

Romae, ad Sanctì Alfonsi,

die 13 decembris 1969

A. AMA.RA.L C.ss.R.

TARCISIO A . .RIOVA..LDO AMARAL C.ss.R.

SuI)€rior Generalis

lmprimatu.r

Curia Archiepiscopalis Perusina

Perusiae, december 1969

Doimrrcus DOTTORINI, Vie. Gen.

STABILD.!E:-."TO TIPOGR-\FICO e GRAFICA » DI SALVI & C. • PERUGCA

INDEX

CONTRIBUTIONES AD PROBLE.MA SPEI

Hl.RI�G B., Das christliche Leben im Zeichen der Hoff-

nung

O'RI0RDA.J.'\1" S., The psychology of Hope

CAPO?'-ì""E D., Cristo: speranza teologica deìl'uomo

:MuRPHY F .X., Hope: its revolutionary aspect in Patristic

Thought

FRIES A., Hoffnung und heilsgewissheit bei Thomas von

7-31

33-55

57-117

119-129

Aquino 131-236

DINGJA.l."l F., Christliche Hoffnung in einer weìtlichen

Welt nach < Gaudium et Spes � 237-263

BoELAA..�S H., La < Teologia della speranza> di Jtirgen

Moltmann 265-305

ENDRES J ., Die Hoffnung bei Ernst Bloch 307-330

SAMPERS A., Academiae Aìfonsianae chronica anni aca-demici 1968-69 . · 331-339

Op-iniones in scriptionibus huius voluminis STUDIORUM MORAL!Ui'tf e:r:pressae de

se non s-unt Academiae Alfonsianae vel Commissionis Redactionis voluminum sed

a.uctoru.m, qui singu.lis contributionibus nomen dant.

Socii Redactionis

Litterarum inscriptio Commissionis Redactionis:

Redazione STUDIA .MORALlA,

Academia Alfonsìana, Via Merulana 31, 00185 RO:\!A Italia

Litterarum inscriptio Administrationis:

Amministrazione STUDIA MORALIA,

Academia Alfonsiana, Via Merulana 31, 00185 ROMA Italia

SEAX O'RI 1)2DA�, C.SS.R.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF HOPE

SC�DJARIU:\1

1. In qt..:antum est thema spec_iale vitae humanae psycmcae spesplerumque neg!egitur et pratermittitur in formis usitatis psychoiogiae empiricae. Pauium de ea reperitur in psychoìogia physiologica vel beha­·viùristica, pau!um quoque in psychologia profundjtatum, quamt.·is sum­mum momentum spei in quantum est vis motrix semper et ubique actuo­�a in tota ,·ita huma!'la evider1tissimum sit. Spes eriim informat et _insi­gnit omnem operationE:m humanam quae ad aliquem finem dirigitur:inseparabilis e::;t ab intentio;ialitate vitae huma;1.ae in qualicu�nquesphaera.

2. Ratio huius negiectus spei in psychologia empirica in eo inve­nitur quod spes est acti\·itas psychica si-rie obiecto exsistente seà tantum possibili. ?.Iethodologia autem usitata psychologiae empiricae postulat cxsi.stentiam obic.cti alicuius activ.itat:s psychicae ut haec act.ivitas eon­e-rete in re1atione cum suo obiecto concreto indagetur. Deficiente tali obiec­to, ut in phenomeno spei deficit, psycho:ogus ernpJ.ricus videtur carere nwten:a scientiae suae et proinàe thema spe_� cedit formi.s 'poeticis' cogi­tationis humanae.

3. Attamen in psychologia empirica recentior.i phenomenon spei ac­cipitur et investigatur prout est ac novae methodi eiaborantur ad eam (et alia themata 'exsistentialia' vitae humanae) explorandam. Reìatio spei ad obiectum non-exsistens sed ca pax exsisten tfoe 'futuritatem' eius constituit. 'Futuritas' est qualitas specifica spei humanae. Spes ad 'futu­rum' necessario tendit sed numquam 'futurum' possidet. Si spes impìetur, ita ut obiec:tum eius in possessionem sperant.i.s transeat, spes cessat in

contextu lwius obiect_i: sed mox haec ipsa impletio spei cessat, quia im­pu!sus spei tunc ad nova obiecta se transfert et nova 'futura' gignit ver­sus quae trahitur homo viator. Vel poUu.s 'futurum' est àimensio ineluc­tabilis vitae humanae quae spem humanam indefesse excitat et quodam­modo c-reat. Spes et 'futurum' inàis:Solubil_iter inter se coniunguntur.

3.

34

4. Psychologia 'exsistentiaiis' phenomeni spei est quidem vera etprofunda sed semper requirit adiumentum aliarum formarum psycho­logiae empiricae, illarum scilicet quae praesen.s humanum investigant. 'Futurum' enim ex praesenti proiicitur, et in sana relatione cum prae­senti consistere debet ut 'futurum' vere humanum sit. 'Futurum' a prae­senti alienatum est chimaericum, furiam, non veram spern, humanam ex­citans, ut his::oria testatur. Methodus igitur 'exsistentialis' non suffidt ad phenomenon speì integre explorandum. Investigandum est etiam id

quod est ut solide investigari possit id quod ·venturum est, uti speramus.

5. Momentum psychologiae ernpiricae them.a.tis spei humanae relatead theologiam spei sic adumbrari potest:

a) Psychologia empirica illuminat omne quod humanum et personale

est in spe theologali;

b) Confirmat humanitatem. 'futuri' quod in Novo Testamento nobispromittitur sed inhurnanitatis taxat 'futurum' quod in tractatibus post­scholasticis De N01Jissimis delineatur;

e) Demonstrat ne�essitatem theologiam 'futuri' nove sed solideconstruendi.

I.

As a specinc theme of human psychological life hope has

been strangely neglected. At the behavioural level of life, even if

we t.ake this in its most rigidly quantitative and measurable sense,

hope is the determìnant of a vast range of human activities, indi­

vidual and social. Every activity in fact that is characterised by

the pursuit of a goal to be att.ained as part of the process of living

may, psycho1ogically, be categorised as hopeful. Thus human

speech is hopeful because it is effected in pursuit of the goal of

communication between men. A question expects an answer: a

statement expects assent or dissent, explicit or implicit. The

speaker literally hopes for a response out of the situation of

communication in which he places himself in regard to other men

by the very act of speaking.

Similarly, all economie activity from the most primitive to

the most technological is goal-directed, purposive and therefore

hopeful. The primitive hunter hunts in hope of game; the modern

manufacturer produces in hope of sales. Economie hope is not

a mere emotional adjunct to or concomitant of a form of activity

identifiable and analysable as economie independently of the hope­

factor which is present in it. It is the specific hope-factor itself

35

which is present in economie situations that makes them economie,

'house-managing' activities. Hope crea.tes economy, sustains and

develops it, anà àirects it to the hoped-for goal that existed as idea

and purpose before the economie proeess started and ·,vithout

which it never would have started sinee hope was from the start

i ts sole determinant.

Again we note the speeific and specifying hope-factor in

human sexual activity, whatever partieular form it takes. It is

purposive activity, reaching out to indiviàual or social goals or

both and not patient of any adequate scientifie description or ana­

lysis in isolation from the hope that characterises and animat-es it.

These are onìy some examples of the behavioural impact of

hope on human !ife - to confine ourselves to that aspect of it

for the moment. The list of behavioural hope-factors in life could

be almost indefinitely extended. Yet the specific nature of human

hope as a determinant of behaviour has got relatively ìittle direct

attention in empirical psychology until recent times. Even depth­

psychology, with its direct focalisation on man·s affective life,

largely bypassed the specific emotion of hope, in -contrast to its

constant preoecupation with the emotion of lo\·e. This neglect of

the hope-theme in life in scientific psychology, physiological,

emotional and social, can undoubtedly be traced to the fact that

hope is in any case a paradoxical and somewhat baff!ing subject

for the empirical psychologist. In its specific and categorical nature

it eludes a strictly empirica! grasp, as this is ordinarily understood

in the positive sciences. It is a behaviour-pattern, a trait, an

attitude, a sentiment, an emotion - depending on the particular

psychological point of view from which you consider it - that

reaches out to and for a rwn-existent object. It cannot be visua­

lised, conceptualised and analysed except in relation to the non­

existent. This poses a problem for the empirical scientist who

naturally wants to have the object of psychological activity as well

as the activity itself right under his eyes. When, therefore, he

finds himself confronted by activities of hope in human life and

has the task of studying them in empiricaì terms, his natural

tendency will be to focus on aspects of these activities that are

concerned with present objects. This will be familiar ground to

him; but in choosing it for his investigation he \Yill in fact be

36

bypassing the specific ground of hope present in and àetermining

the activity he stuàies. Hope as a categorical relation to the non­

existent will figure only as an indirect or incidental feature of the

resnlts of his researches, however valuable they may be as analyses

of those aspects of hope which are related to present, existent

objects. But these aspects of hope, bearing on here-and-now

objects, while they certainly belong to the totality of the hope­

syndrome, are not hope itself. In fact with the further relati on to

the non-existent left out of them they are not hope at all. They

automatical1y turn into other specific psychological activities

- love, hate, aggression, fear, an..�iety, depression - which more

easily admit of investigation and analysis in terms of the here­

and-now 1•

It may be objected to this summary of the position of hope as

a theme of empirical psychology that, while it may be true that

hope has hitherto got less specific attention than it deserves in

empirical research, the reason assigned for this neglect cannot be

true. The study of goals of human b€haviour has- for a long time

held a major place in the fields of physiological and social psycho­

logy - and goals are of their nature as yet in the future and

therefore non-existent in relation to the acting subject. As for

àepth-psychology, Freud himself always emphasised the non­

existent character of the object of neurotic an..xiety 2• Empirica!

psychology ha.s in fact taken constant account of the non-existent

object present in human psychologicai activity of various kinds.

How then can psychology b€ accused of a methodological fauìt to

explain its- comparative indifference in the past to the specific

psychological theme of hope?

A closer analysis of the method of empirica.I psychology in

dealing with non-existent objects will show the inadequacy of this

answer to the point made above about the preoccupation of psy­

chology with existent objects. Goals of behaviour have certainly

1 On the methodology of psychology ci. C.C. PR..UT, Thc Logie of Modern

Psychology (New York 1948); J.A. GASSON', Tke Concept of -e Th.eory > in Scie71CP

and in Psychology, in �LA. AR..'-iOLD and J.A. GASSON, ed., The Human Person: An

Approach to an Integra! Theory of Personality (New York, 1954), ::,p. 49-80.

2 < Neurotic anxiety is anxiety in regard to a danger which we do not know> (The Problem o/ Anz-ietv, chap. 11).

37

been widely anà deeply studied in physiologìcal anà social psycho­

logy, and depth-psychology has endlessìy analysed the presence

of the non-existent in human emotional ìife, not only in con­

nexion with anxiety but in general in connexion with the

all-important role oÌ phantasy in psychic life. Strictly, however,

most in vestigations of this kind are not really concerned

with the non-existent object as non-existent but \vith ideational or

emotional shapes given to it in the psychic life of the subject

here and now. They bear on the present, actual existence in and

for the psyche (or behaviour) of the subject of objects which are,

in their objectivity, non-exisrent for him. Thus goals will be stuàieà

in rerms of the way in which the subject figures them to himself

and in which they determine his behaviour here and now. It is the

present psyc.hic existence of the goal that is studied, not its

psychic futurity for the subject 3• But the psychic as well as the

objective futurity of the goal is an essential, indeeà the essential,

element of any hoping activity 4• True, this futurity takes adva.nce

shapes of an ideational or emotional kind in the present, existent

life of the subject and these spur him on and sustain him in his

pursuit of the desireà 1 non-existent, hoped-f or goal. But they are

not the goal itself in its psychic futurity nor do they constiture

the psychic or behavioural pursuit of the objective (but future

anà therefore non-existent) goal. A truly hopeful man (or group)

always knows, and shows that he h.--nows, the difference between

the 'presence' that his goal has for him here and now and the

futurity that it also, and especially, has for him. "\Yhat either a man or a group hopes for is the goal in its futurity a.s object, so that

the hope itself is thereby rendered ·futurist'. The 'futurism' of

hope is not merely an inner-psychic experience: it is ;llso a fact

of hope-derermined behaviour. A.Il purposive and hopeful behaviour

3 Psychological studies of the pursuit of the status-goal in socia! life are

concerned v.-ith the impact of the desired 9oal on lije during the pur1mit, not v.-ith

the dimension of < futurity > in the desire and the pursuit the::nsclves. Cf. V. PACK!RD, Thc Status Seckcrs (New York, 1950).

4 This is why, once a goal has been attained and thus ceases to have � futurity >,

it is at once replaced by another goal in stil! anocher <future> as the objcct of

hoping activity. This specific quality of hope - that it must alw'.!.ys reach out

to but can ne,er possess its < future :> - is onìy touched on in goal-psycholog-y,

thoug-h the nndings of this psychology are always illustratL:::g thc phenomenon.

38

is 'futurist': it is directed towards a non-existent object as non­

existent (but deemed to be capable of attainment). Thìs 'futurism' of the hope-syndrome and of hopeful behaviour points up the clear psychological distinction that exists between hope as specifically

hope and advance concepts or phantasies or 'models' of the hoped­for object that enter into psychic and behavioural life here and now and that are, in fact, present, existent realities of that life. They are psychically and behaviourally welcomeà as 'present' instal­ments of what, it is hoped, will come, but are in no way confused,

except in psychic conditions of neurosis or psychosis, with the hoped-for reality itself. Indeed the confusion that does arise in

neurotic and psychotic conditions between the 'present' phantasy of a hoped-for object and the hoped-for object itself in its concrete

and psychic futurity is quite accurately describable and analysable as a psychic incapacity for hope. The subject is at least temporariìy incapacitated from reaching out to and pursuing goals in the·ir

futurity: he is trapped in their phantastic 'presence' to him here

and now and cannot get outside or beyond this. Without the capa­city for 'futurist' ideation, emotion and behaviour man is literally 'hopeless', however many features of his present psychic life are linked with non-existent objects (whether these be goais, purposes, phantasies, projections, or anything else). The prevalent weakness of physiological and behavioural psychology in relation to the theme of hope lies precisely in the fact that, v.:-hile it certainly does study the psychic functioning of non-existent objects in human !ife, it takes these non-existent objects in the present, existent realit-y

which they assume - ideationally, phantasticaìly, emotionally, behaviourally - in psychic life and is thus blocked from ta.king proper account of the essential 'futurism' of hope. In dealing with

the advance shapes assumed by the hoped-for object in the present

psychic life of the subject this kind of psychology has, after all, a present, existent object to work on and can thus remain faithful to an empirical method of investigation originally borrowed from the physical sciences; but the ·futurism' of hope disappears in this methodological process and with it the true psychic reality of hope itself.

Exactly the same methodological criticisrn applies to the pre­occupation of depth-psychology, especially in its Freudian form,

39

v;ith the 'presence' in the psyche of non-existent objects. It deals with their psychic presence, which is certainly very real and ac­counts for the phenomenon of cathexis on which Freud threw so

much light s; but it has little to say about the experience of objects

that have to be non-existent, but are still deemed to be capable

of coming or being brought into existence, for the experience it­seìf to take place. Tnere is question here of an experience directed

towards the object a� future, not towards such psychic 'presence'

as the object may already have in the here-and-now. The experience

is essentially 'futurist', not 'presential', though it will of course contain 'presential' psychic elements. Freud illuminated the °pre­

sential' psychic aspect of non-existent obj ects but not their psychic 'futurism'. Yet the affective 'futurism' of hope - in so far as hope

is an affective experience, which it undoubtedly is in part, though

not wholly - is, as we have seen, essential to the hope-experience

as such. If the 'futurist' dimension of the hope-aff ect is disregarded

or played down in it, it ceases to be a specific hope-affect. All that

we have left of it then is 'presential' psychic elements àivorced from their 'futurist' orientation, and it is in fact on these 'pre­sential' elements that depth-psychology mostly focuses, since it too, though in a more empatheti� way, shares the methodological

inclination taken over by physiological and behavioural psychology from the physical sciences to study present and existent objects, not 'futurist' ones 6

• Freud himself was suspicious of all 'futurism'

anyway, seeing it as a wiàe-open field for the psychic mechanism

of irrational projection 1• He deprecated the holding out of high

5 < Cathexis. Accumulation of rnental energy on some particular idea, memory,

or line of thought or action > (J. DREVER. A Dictionary oj Psychology, revised by

H. WALLERSTEIN (London, 1964], p. 35) ..

6 On the empathetic rnethod of psychoanalysis cf. K. STER:-.-. Th.e Third Rei·o-.

lution (London, 1955), pp. 132 ff. Stern, himself a psychoanalyst, nevertheless adds:

< It is the tragedy of psycho-analysis that it was evolved by a nineteenth-century

scientist who was very careful to remain what one used to call "scientific". In

order to remain scientific, in that sense, you have to E!xcluàe anything which is

transcendental, in other words, which "goes beyond'' that tt:hich is perceived by our

senses and can be measured > (p. 147: italics mine).

7 Hence his ìnsistence on the < reduction > of < mental !ife to the (past and

present) interplay of reciprocally urging and checking forces > (Pt.:tir,hogenic Visual

Disturban.ce, in Collected Papcrs, vol. II).

40

hopes for humanity 8, and if his own life was a signal example of

hopeful effort in the field of psychological research, sustained

through long years of neglect and opposition on the part of

academic psychologists, this had its roots in his personal qualities of courage and integrity, not in his psychoanalytic theory which

has, actually, very little place for hope 9•

II.

If empirical psychology was to come to grips at all with hope

in its actual reality as a 'driving' - indeed the 'àriving' - force

in human life, it would have to do so by means of a considerable methodological change. Hope would have to be taken seriously as

an authentic psychic and behavioural phenomenon, a quite �ormaì'

and in fact quite necessary factor in human life. This would logic­

ally mean taking the tfuturism' of hope seriously, since without

its 'futurism' hope would no longer be hope but a composite psychic

residue. This in .turn would mean giving empirica! status to the

concept of 'the future' - the non-existent which it is hoped to bring

into existence or to see coming into existence. How could this be clone in a genuinely scientific manner? Traditionally, in psychology

as in other empirical sciences 'the future' was regarded as a concept that could only be given scientific status in so far as it could be

accurately predicted from empirical facts availa.ble here and now.

It was deduced from present evidence, not �hoped for'. Thus astro­

nomers could accurately predict eclipses in the future and the edipse so predicted, though stili in the future, was already a datum

of science. It was astrology, not astronomy, to thope for' eclipses

or any other celestìal phenomena. The 'hoped-for' future, whatever

else it might be, was not a 'thing' or even a concept that science

could take seriously. It would have to be Ieft to poets, social

a < As for the future in general I do not think he spared it much thoug-ht.

He was so aware of the enormous complexity of. both material circumstances and

psychological motives that it was a vraste of time to speculate on such an unpre­

dictabie thing as the future> (E. Jo:-tES, The Li/e and Work of Sigmund Freud,

ed. and abridged by L. TRILLI.-...G and S. MARCUS (New York, 1961], p. 471).

9 L. Trilling speaks of < Freud's notion of how a li.le must be lived: with

sternness, fortitude, and honour > (Introduction to E. JONE.S, The !,ife a.nd Work

o/ Sigmu.nd Freud, p. 14).

41

Utopians, political ideologists, religious beìievers, and others \Vho deaìt in visions and prophecies which might or might not have an element of truth in them but certainly not of a kind amenable

to the evidential methods of positive science. The 'hoped-for' future simply did not in any sense e:dst for science.

Yet all the time the 'hoped-for' future was a 'àriving' 1 dynamic, determining force in the actual lif e of men - including the actual lives of the scientists themselves. l\foreover, it was a force of increasing po;,ver in the public life of mankind which was now being caught up as never before in history in vast hope-animated projects, political, social, economie and cultural. 'The future', the object of human hope on a fully human scale, was having 'pre­sential' effects that the social psychologist for one would have to reckon with, even if he followed the traditional scientific method of giving serious attention only to the 'presential' social effects of the 'futurist' dream and not taking much account of the 'futurism' of the dream and the hope itself. !vfarxism in particular forced the psychic importance of the hoped-for future a.s future on the notice of psychologists who �.vere prepared to revise their scientific me­thodology to cope with the inescapable •futurism' and the essential and necessary hopefulness of human existence, though the push towards methodological change carne from other sources as well. Hope was now seen to be a theme of Iife that empirical psychology could not avoid and could not reduce to 'presential' elements of psychic life. It would ha ve to be considered, observed and analysed in its own right as the human expectancy and pursuit of the non­existent but (at least ideationally) possible 'future' 10•

The p:roblem still remained of giving scientific reality to the elusive concept of 'the future' - a non-existent, hoped-for 'future' that could not be regarded as predetermined and predictable in empirical terms of the accepted kind. True, Marxism, side by side with its 'hope', had a determinist theory of 'the future' as well and

10 e Since human beings are always living through to the future and its

continua! possibilities, they are always going beyond themselves and making their worlds. Transcendence and possibility characterize human existence > (H. Koa:L,

Th.e Age o/ Complezity (New York, 1965), p. 167, explaining the basic insight of Binswange::-'s < existential analrsis >).

42

offered predictions of the course of history on the basis of it 11; but outside the ranks of :Marxist believers and hopers this theory carried no weight as science. There was no evidential proof of it in the facts available to science here and now. On the contrary the Marxist theory of a predetermined and predictable 'classless' heaven on earth as the culmination of the historical process ran counter to many known facts about the socio-political nature of man 12• Neither the :Marxist 'future' nor any other species of human hoped-for 'future', from the global 'futures' of the political, social, economie and cultural ideologues down to the humble, limited 'futures' envisaged in the everyday social, economie and sexual life of men, could be reduced to the neat category of the empirically verifiable 'future', like the 'future' of eclipses and cometary appe­arances. The 'future' of hope, whether it was a large-scale or a small-scale hope, was, like hope itself (of which it was the crea­tion), an autonomous kind of reality in human existence - non­existent yet in another way sovereignly existent in its very non­existence. The paradox of this 'future' was a fact of human exis­tence; the paradox of hope was the key-fact of the life of man upon earth. These paradoxes would have to be accepted as empiric­al realities in their oi.vn right, though of a distinctive kind. They would have to be granted scientific existence on their Ol;vìl terms and psychology would have to alter its traditional methodology to· bring them within its scopes. The penalty for not doing so would inevitably be the alienation of empirica! psychology from what was deepest and most determinant in the actual life of men and its reduction to a science of the marginalia of psychic life.

So empirical psychology took to the study of 'futurism' as a normal and necessary dimension of human life, individua! and

11 Both these aspects of Marxism are ably presented in J. LACROI.X, L' Homme

Marxiste, originally published in La. Vie lntellectuelle, vol. 15, n. 8-9 (Paris, 1947),

pp. 27-59.

12 Sociologica! criticism of the Marxist theory of social evolution goes back to G . .MOSCA, Elementi di scienza p-0litica. (1896) and V. PARETO, Trattato di so­

ciologia generale (1915-1919). Both show the sociologica1 necessity and inevitability of élites in all society, which the Marxist theory of the inevitable historical emergence

of a classless society denies.

43

social. Homo sperans 13 became an empirica! theme of scientific

investigation. His hope was accepted as a fully normal aspect of

his being - an aspect without which he would not be man at all.

The various forms of his hope could be studied and correlated with

other norma1 aspects of his being, thus opening the way for an

analysis of constructive and negative types of the hope-syndrome.

Naturally, this approach to human hope and to the hoped-for

'future' towards which it is directed and which it in fact creates

and sustains as a positive pole of existence (though itself here and

now non-existent), formed part of a new and wider methodological

approach to the \.Yhole matter of human psychic life. The love­

syndrome too carne in for a new analysis. Physiological and

behaviour psychology studied its concrete, measurable manifesta­

tions: depth-psychology studied the interplay of inner-psychic

forces that went into it but in a closed psychic field: the new

thematic psychology, as we may call it, saw it as an open-enàed

form of personal and social life, creating its oz�-n 'world' out of

physiological, affective and behavioural materials that offered

themselves to its grasp. The 'world' of love transce11.ded the

materials out of which it was made - or rather, out of which

love made its 'worlàt

- just as the 'future' and the whole 'world'

of hope transcend the raw materials of every kind out of which

hope makes them. Thematic psychology accepted the human 'worldst

of man - the '\vorld' of his hope, of his love, of his communion

with other men, of his creative work in the human world - analys­

ing them separately and synthesising them in the tota1ity of anthro­

pological experience. Man's 'existence' in love, hope, inter-commu­

nion, individual and social creativity, and in all the other themes

that combine to make the theme of genuine human life as a tota.lity,

here becomes the peak - subject of psychological study - stil! an

empirica! study on empirical lines but no·.v unreservedly open to

all the breadth and length and height and depth of human expe­

rience, paradoxes and all 14•

It was entirely natural that this fresh approach to human

psychic lif e and to the hope-factor in it in particular should borrow

1J G. �fARCEL's, Homo t·iator: cf. his work of th.at name (Paris. 1944).

H Cf. H. THO:.t.-1..E, Personlichkeit (Berlin, 1951); P. LERSCH, Der A.uibau der

Person (�fu:1ich, 1951). G.W. ALL?ORT'S psychology of < becoming- > reaches the same

44

from the new philosophy of 'existence' which was then in the air in European thought. The philosophy of 'existence' in its various forms was a philosophy, springing from and based on processes of reflection on the meaning of common human experience at the phe­nomenal level; it did not presuppose methods of scientific empirical investigation applied to wide areas of actual psychic life. This latter was the field proper to the empirical psychologist, even when he saw his field in terms of specifically human themes of living. He f ourul those themes empirically present in the actual field he studied and in that way stayed within the methodology of his science, though it was now considerably different from what it had been when it had no place for 'futurism'. Still the themes discovered by the empi­rical psychologist as inherent in and determinant of human life, individual and social, were also to a considerable degree the themes analysed and synthesised by phenomenological and existential thought of a philosophical kind. The psychologist then pro­ceeded to learn from the philosopher with a view to shar­pening the tools of his ovrn trade and to reaching more detailed and exact conclusions regarding the functioning of

· the concrete psychic life of man 15• This method of perfecting

the thematic approach to empirical psychic phenomena hadits dangers: the .abstractions of the philosopher might now beread into the empirica.I phenomena themselves, thus isolatingthe human themes of living from their concrete, scientificallyesta.blished reality in the process of living. The psychologist, in aword, might distort his materia.I in his anxiety to make it fit intothe categories of the philosopher, whereas, as an empirical psycho-

conclusion by a different route (cf. his Personality: A Psychological lntnpretation (New York, 1937]; Becoming: Baa-ic Cons-iderations /or a Psychology o/ Personality (New Haven, 1960]; Pattern and Growth in Personality [New York, 19611). < Beeo­ming > is also the centra.I theme of C.R. ROCERS' psychology of personality (cf. espe­

cially his On Becoming a Person [Boston, 1961]).

15 L. B!NSWANGER led the way in this and has since had many followers. See

his The Ezistential Analysis· School of Thought in R. MAY et al., ed., Existence (New York, 1958). Cf. also A. Y!N KA.A.M, The Third Force in European Psychology (Green¼'ich, Delaware, 1960). The va1ue for empirica! psychology of Sartre's < exi­stential psychoanalysis > (Part IV, chap. 2 of L'Etre et le i.Véant) is recognised by May. < The centra! principle of existential psychoanalysis '\\-;Hl not be libici.o or w-ill to power but the individual's choice o/ being > (Introduction to J.-P. SARTRE, Existential Psychoanalysis, trans. H.E. BARXES (New York, 1953]).

logist, he should accept no category of the philosopher that he did

not see evidenced beyond question in his materia!. Freud was

similarly c.aught by the philosophical determinism of the 19th

century and read this determinism into all the affective materi.al

he studied, which was one of the reasons why there is so little of

hope in his psychoìogy. The thematic or, as he carne to be called

after he began borrowing from the philosophy of 'existence', 'exis­

ten tial' psychologist incurred no such danger. Instead he was

exposeà to the danger of overdoing thematic or 'existential' hope

in his empirica! work. Hope is, as we have seen, a major, in fact

the caràinal, theme of human existence; but it can emerge and

develop as a theme only on the basis of innumerable psychic factors

of a physiological, affective and soci.al kind, which must never be

lost sight of and the existence of which necessitates continuing

contributions from physiologic.al, affective and social psychology

to thematic or 'existential' psychology.

This inevitable and healthy àependence of hope on given phy­

siologic.al, affective and sociaì conditions of psychic life is in fact

underplayed in some presentations of thematic or 'existential' hope,

as though hope owed little to its grounds in 'nature' and could well

up spontaneous1y in the 'person' as person 16• A clear demonstra­

tion of the fallacy of this genetic theory of hope is provided by

Bowlby's research into infantile depression - the 4: listless, quiet

unhappy, and unresponsive » behaviour-patterns of the « typical

separated infant � :

In what conditions, it may be asked, does this develop? In genera!, it is characteristic of infants who have had a happy relationship with their mothers up till six or nine months and are then suddenly separated from them without an adequate substitute being provided. Of ninety­five chHàren on whom a diagnosis was made, 20 p€r cent reacted to se­paration by severe depression, and another 27 per cent by mild depression, making nearly 50 per cent in all. Aìmost al! those with a close and !oving relation to their mothers suffered, which means that the depressive response to separation is a normal one at this age. The fact that a majority of those with unhappy relationships escaped indicates that their inner deveìopment was already damaged and their later capacity

ì,; Thus A. VAN KAA.M, Rel1"gion and Per:wnality (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1964) clear!y exaggerates the indepen<lence of < the spirit > from < socia! an<l biolo­gical determinism > (p. 105).

46

for love likely to b€ impaired .... Some obserrers believe that after three months of deprivation there is a qualitative change, after which recovery is rarely, if ever, complete 17

•

Bowlby is here considering the damage done to an infant's

< capacity for love � by his being deprived of the sheltering, com­

forting love of his mother at a critica! age, and in fact his whoìe

study is concerned with this subject. But it is clear from the

detailed evidence he marshals that the damage is not merely done

to the child's capacity for love: the child's hope is also and perhaps

chiefly frustrateci and broken. The depressed child of his clinical

descriptions is above all a hopeless child: the deepest psychic wound

lies there and the subsequent incapacity for love that shows up in

the child's personality is rather a consequence of this than an in­

dependent trauma, since, as thematic research into the nature of

love has shown, there cannot be "love without an ingredient of hope

and a conditfon of tot.al hopelessness incapacitates its victim for

love. This diagnosis of the situation is confirmed by what Bowlby

says, again on the basis of of careful factual research, about the

age at which a child ceases < being liable to damage by a lack of

maternal care »:

All who have studied the matter would agree that between three and five years the risk is stili serious, though much less so than ea.rlier. During this period children no longer live e.xclusively in the present,

and ca.n consequently conceive dimly of a time when their mothers wiU return, which is impossible to most chi ldren younger than three. Fu rther­more, the ability to talk permits of simple explana.tions, and the child \l?ill take more readily to understanding mother-substitutes 18•

In other words, the child after three is capable of ideational

'futurism' and ideational hope, which enables him to transcend his

being deprived of his mother and to create for himself a new

'world' of hope and consequently of love as well. His « capacity for

love � can develop undamaged because the theme of hope in his

life has successfu11y survived the Ioss of its original but no longer

essential object-the 'future' embodied in his mother. It can create

and atta.eh itself to a new 'future' now- the 'future' of his mother's

17 J. BOWLBY, Child Care and the Growth of Love (London, 1953), a summary

o! a report for the World Health Organization on materna! care and mental

health, p. 24.

18 Op. cit., pp. 29-30: italics mine.

47

return or the 'future' embodied in an « understanàing mother­

substitute. » Bowlby generalises too much about ìove here and

elsewhere in his stuày, not iàentifying the hope-factor within love

itself, though it is this factor above ali that is destroyed in maternal

deprivation and though it is this factor too, surviving deprivation,

that enables the older chi Id to make good his losses. Bu t he is

excellent in showing that psychophysical conàitions antecedent to

the emergence of ideational hope in the small child can block f or

ever, or at least impair f or ever, the later emergence of ideational

love and hope in him. The damage to the child's nature here proves

to be permanently damaging to his person in the ·existential' sense.

Ho\vever, with this caution about never underestimating the

psychophysical bases of hope in the human person there must go

a clear and strong acknowledgment of the value of thematic

analyses of hope, including those that borrow considerably (but

wisely, on grounds of adequate empirical evidence) from the phi­

losophy of 'existence'. Such analyses serve to clarify psychophysical

processes themselves, as we have just seen in the case of Bowlby's

undiff erentiated presentation of the psychophysical processes of

love in infants. Once we grasp the thematic and 'existentiaì' nature

of hope we can trace it back empirically to its pre-ideational

foundations in psychophysical life. We can identify pre-ideational

hope in infants thernselves and not confuse it with general pre­

ideational love. This identification has also a therapeutic value,

since a practical consequence of it will be the recognition of the

importance of giving the maternally deprived infant a pre-idea­

tional 'world' to hope f or. His need is for a pre-ideational 'future'

to constitute him in his human existence and thus make him

capable of hopeful love, which is really what Bowlby has in mind

when he writes of « a close and Ioving relation >> between the child

and his mother or mother-substitute.

A caution similar to that entered about the neglect of the

psychophysical foundations of hope in a unilatera! thematic psy­

chology of hope must also be entered regarding the neglect of the

social foundations of hope. Thematic and 'existential' psychology

has much to say about interpersonal relationships and 'transpar­

ency' in the communion of man with man. Its hopeful human group

is characterised by the 'openness' of each one to the other in the

48

shared but dynamic and flexible pursuit of a common 'project of existence'. Each and ali --each for all and all for each - live in the radiance of a common 'future' which gives ·meaning' to the here-and-now, making it an 'existential' (because future-oriented) 'presence' (to emphasise the personal and interpersonal character of the 'present' so brought into existence by the shared 'futurism' of the group). Ali other themes of its life, including the love-theme, derive from and have their roots in its hope and in the object of that hope - a 'future' that is as yet non-existent but that shall be brought into existence (the vita venturi saeculi of the Christian creed, taken in its anthropological reality which may be indepen­dent of and even opposed to the Christian reifications and formu­lations of the nature of that life). This is the authentic 'world' of personal and interpersonal 'encounter'. Any form of human group­life that falls short of this specifically human 'reality' - a 'reality' that postulates as its foundation the non-existent but realisable 'future' - reduces man both as an individual and as a social being to an 'object of nature' bereft of a human 'future' and of human hope, and therefore depersonalised and dehumanised from the start 19

•

This is certainly a profound and exact analysis of the nature of genuinely persona! and interpersonal group-life. But group-life in this sense can only grow out of humbler forms of psychosocial life which are largely pre-personal in character. Every inàividual human lif e has in any case to be gin at a pre-personal psychosocial level - that of psychosocial infancy. For the understanding of this we have to depend on social psychology, which is the psycho­Iogy of social processes of living regardless of whether they are strictly personal or not - and many of them, as the evidence shows, always remain subpersonal even in highly personalised individuals and groups :x>. If thematic and 'existential' social psy­chology neglects the pre-personal and subpersonal substratum of persona! and interpersonal life and holds itself aloof from general social psychology (the science of man's psychosocial ·nature'), it

19 Cf. R.C. KWA!-t'T, Encounter (Pittsburgh, 1960); J.H. VAN' DEN BERG, The

Phenomenological Approach. to Psychiatr:1, chap. 3, < Historical Survey, Summary

Discussion of Phenomenological Literature � (Oxford, 1955).

:::o Cf. W. J. H. SPROTT, Hu.man Grou.ps (London, 1958).

49

does so at its peril. Whether they ìike it or not persons have �a­tures' and ·natures' take their revenge in ali kinds of ways, overt and subterranean, when persons do not give them àue recognition and attention - as Freud pointed out when he \.Vrote of of the kickbacks against the Ego that repressed sexuality knows well how to deliver. Thematic psychology is right in insisting on the human person's transcendence of 'nature'; but if it is to be a healthy and constructive transcendence, it must 'assume' and inte­grate 'nature' into the themes of living that constitute the specifi­ca.lly human 'world' of being. Otherwise thernatic living itself will be constantly menaced and may well be undermined by irruptions and eruptions from the non-integrated (or 'existentially repressed') 'world' of 'nature', as is evidenced by the history of pureìy the­matic experiments in living, ancient as well as modem. When 'futurism' becomes isolated from 'presentiality', except in so far as it creates its own future-oriented 'presentiality', and from the human historicitr that underlies 'presentiality' it...�Ii, linking it to the human historical past, it can easily become narrow and fanatical. 'Enthusiasm', milleniarism, apocalypticism - these and similar thematic and 'existential' deviations are the fruit of pure 'futurism' and of discarnate hope 21•

There is no solid substance and therefore no future in such 'futurism': it either disintegrates from within, leaving disappoint­ment and bitterness in its train, or it intensifies itself to the point of «existential' psychosis and dies in the conflicts generated, either within itself or with the 'world' of 'nature' outside the 'futurist' ranks, by the totally future-oriented 'presentiality' which it creates for the purposes of day-to-day living. We thus come up against another paradox of human 'futurism' and hope. Hope creates the human present (or 'presence'); but it can only do this sanely and constructively if it works on and respects the already given 'presentiality' of human ·nature' and of human history. Past, pre­sent and future are aU in their different ways constituents of human 'existence'. Memory of the past, experience of the present, hope for the future: ·existence' contains and synthesises them all.

zt On this see R-�- KNox, Enthusiasm: A Chapter in th.e Histor,; o/ Religion,

with. Special Rejerence to th.e X-VII cmd XVIII Centltries (Oxford, 1950).

"·

50

Thematic psychology rightly makes hope the 'projective' force that transforms memory of the past and experience of the present into 4.'. originality of life, expression, and behavior » 11 for indivi­dua! human persons and interpersonal groups; but memory of the past and experience of the present exist as given reaìities in their own right prior to the transformative action vvrought on them by •projective' hope, and this fact, which is of vital impor­tance for the constructive functioning of hope itself, renders it all the more necessary for thematic psychology to keep itself open to continual inner enrichment from forms of empirical psychology that focus on the elements of memory and experience in human psychic life. At the same time thema.tic psychology throws consta.nt light from the angle of perso-rw.l life in the individual and of interpersonal life in human groups on psychic processes of memory and experience that prepare the way for personal and inter­personal life, tha.t always accompany these, and that have to be harmonised with and integrated into them if they are to have the quality of genuine human < originality :r> and are not to become arbitrary, anarchical, ·unnatural' - which would only be to arrive at depei-sonaìisation by another route. Physiological, beha­vioural, affecti ve and social psycholog-y: the psychology of think­ing: ali kinds of psychology, in short, that deal with the 'presen­tiality' of human life - thematic psychology can go over the materia! brought to light by them all and trace the gradua! emer­gence in it of the hope-theme and other themes of strictly persona! and interpersonal life. In the same way it can go over the frustra­tions and distortions of psychic life described and analysed in detail by such forms of empirica.I psychology and see them as blocks and hindrances to the emergence and development of au­thentic hope, love, faith, confidence, courage and other themes of persona! living, as we saw above when we took a thematic standpoint in regard to Bowlby's findings about the consequences of materna! deprivation in children.

A well-balanced psychology of hope must, then, consider it f_rqm ali angles and in all its elements, including those that do not show up directly at the thematic level. Hope is a / orrn, indeed the

zz A VAN K.uM, Religion and Peraonality, p. 49.

51

form, of human living. It enters into all human liYing; but all

human living, in turn, enters into it. The psychology of hope is in

fact extremely complex and there are no short cuts through it.

Short-cut conceptions of human hope and short-cut action based

on them may solve some immediate problems of human immersion

in 'presentiality', but they leave other probìems untouched anà

may well add new problems to them - a point abundantly exem­

plified in case-histories, both indiviàual and social. For a social

example one has only to consider what actually happeneà to the

}Iarxist hope when it gained ascendancy in the lives of millions

of men. It violated the humanity in whose name it createci and

strove for its particular kind of 'future', forcing Marxist huma­

nists to adopt a 'revision' both of the hope itself and of the 'future'

which is its object z3• Short-cut psychologies of hope run into the

same impasse. They point to one 'existential' v..-ay forward through

the confusion of life - only to find that ·existence' must after all

come to terms with 'nature' or eise perish. An integrai psycholog--.1

of hope must find roots for hope in the whole of psychic life - in

its 'futurism' to begin with, certainly, but also in its 'presentiality'

and historicity. Yet the primacy of 'futurism' in hope must always

be susta.ined in the psychology as well as in the philosophy and

theology of hope, since the primary roots of hope are always in the

realm of the possible and desirabìe 'future\ not in that of the

actual present or of the once-upon-a-time but no longer actual

past. Human hope and the human 'future' are so necessarily and

inextricably intertwined that they cannot even for a moment be

separated without eliminating hope, and therefore humanity,

from man.

III.

The relation of the psychology to the theology of hope are

manifold. Here I will only attempt to indicate three of them

briefly:

1) The elpis (hope) of the New Testament is the fulness of

� the hope of Israel :\) (Acts 28, 20). It is a divine gift, as was < the

Zl Cf. E. BLOCH, D'.l.s Prin=ip Hoff rmng (Fran kfurt, 1:?59).

52

hope of Israel » in the Old Covenant. But equally it is a humaY?.

hope, a grace of the Holy Spirit incarnate in the hopefulness of men. :\fan hopes divinely but at the same time fuìly humanly when he has elp-is. It is a new and divinely actuateà form of the hope­theme in his life, individual and social: it is nota totally other kind of hope-theme, somehow inserted into him apart from his ordi­nary human capacity for hope. There is even clinical proof of this. Acute and intense depression or aff ective loss of hope in a Christian man, which is a pathological condition of his human psyche, affects him in the sphere of elpis also. He 'despairs·, affectively speaking: hope in God 'means' nothing ro him any more. N ot being able to hope any more in ordinary human terms, he cannot hope in terms of elpis either. On the other hand, when under psychotherapy or even chemotherapy hopefulness returns to his psyche, elp-is returns along with it. The hope-theme is substantially one in his psychic ìife all the time, his elpis being simply the supreme form of it. This is not to reduce elpis to general human hopefulness but simply to point out that it is a Spirit-activated kind of human hopefulness. Because of this fact the psycho1ogy of hope has a direct relevance for · the theology of hope.· It illuminates all that

is hunuz.n in elpis, which is a vast amount of it. A theology of hope which did not 'assume' and integrate into itself ali that we can learn about hope from the empirical stuày of it would necessarily be incomplete. This is particularly true of the moral and pastoral theology of hope.

2) The 'future' which constitutes the object of hope has to bea human 'future' - a 'future into which a man can 'project' himself as man. A non-human 'future' - a 'future' to which man cannot relate himself anthropologically - cannot constitute an object of real hope. In hope man transcends his 'presentiality' in the name of and for the sake of his 'futurity' - but precisely because it is in his 'futurity' that he discerns the possibiiity for himself of being 'more man'. The elpis of the New Testament is faithful to this requirement of the hope-theme in human life. Its object is the risen lif e, «: the redemption of our bodies » of which we already have < the first fruits » here and now (Rom. 8, 23). This 'future' and the 'presentiality' ( 4: the first_ fruits ») which it creates in us

53

here and no\v through the po'vver of the Risen Christ and the gift

of the Holy Spìrit are indeed gifts of God; but they are truly

human realities as well. The 'future' of New Testament elpis is a

genuinely anthropological 'future'. The same can not be said of

the kind of 'future' off ereà to the hope of man in post-scholastic

theology. :Man could not relate himself as man to that kind of

'future'. It postuìated some kind of being other than man, and in

fact it was presented as a 'future' for what was called his 'soul'.

This non-anthropological theology of hope struck at the roots of

real hope in man. It left him, a.s ma.rz, psychicaUy 'hopeless'. This

insight into post-scholastic theology, which comes from stuàying

it anew in the light of the psychology of hope, provides a fresh

clue to the meaning of the process of àechristianisation. 'I"nis is

generally assumed to mean a gradual process of loss of f aith in

once-Christian peopìes. It would surely be more accurate to see

it as a gradual process of loss of elpis in them. The •future' off ered

to them in Christian preaching as the object oÌ their hope ceased

to have anthropological reality for them - and so ceased to have

theological reality also. Meanwhile other and seemingly much

better •futures' were opening out before them and becoming focu­

ses of the hope-theme in their lives. In these psychological circum­

stances the choice they made between 'futures' was undersumda­

ble and indeed inevitable. They exchanged the abstract 'heaven'

of current Church teaching for secular ·tutures' that beckoned to

them a,s men.

3) The present-day renewal of the theology of hope in the

Church, of which other articles in this volume have much to say,

is still too much focused, from the psychological point of view, on

the subjectlve character and quality of elpis. This has now been

well restored to its true locus in the thematic and ·existential' life

of man. It is also true that elpis is assigned its true object in

contemporary theology - the escha.ton of the resurrection, already

partially present to redeemeà man in the here-and-now. But the

'future' of Christian hope - that 'future' as a 'future' f or men

today - is still ìacking in anthropologicaì substance. The concepts

of biblical anthropology wiìl not, as such, suffice here since they

are tied to a historical human pa.st and our need is for 'futurist'

54

concepts. We need to take the basic 'futurism' of biblica.1 theology and reconceptualise it in contemporary 'futurist' terms. This was just what Teilhard de Chardin did, and whatever may be thought of his particular brand of 'futurism' it was at least a courageous and heartening effort in the right direction.

Gaudium et spes was Vatican II's contribution to the renewal of the theology of hope and to the theological construction of a 'future' for moàern man. Psychologica.lly it has many satisfying features 24

; but again it is better on the subjective nature and force of elpis than in its projection of a theological and anthropological 'future' for the Church and the worìà of today. Past and present loom larger in its thoughts than the 'future' a.s future. The memory­element in its meditation on hurnan existence is strong and there is strength too in the experience of the present contained in it; but its thru.st towards the future is relativeìy weak, though it has many 'futurist' indications that could be combined to form a thrustful 'futurist' theology. Theological 'futurism' in the post­conciliar age is spread over many fields and is quite thrustful in some of them - Dutch theology being outstanding in this respect :?�.

The influence of 'existentiaì' philosophy and psycholo6.:r is evident in all theology of this kind; but so far it has not profited adequately by psychologic.aì research into the physioìogical, behavioural, af-· fective, social and cognitive eìements of human psychic life. The àangers of this neglect of 'nature' in man ha ve been stress.ed in the present article. 'Nature' without 'personality' is hopeless, but 'personality' divorced from ·nature' ends up by being hopeless too.

An adequate 'futurist' theology for our time must, at a higher leve!, reproduce the characteristics of an adequate psychology of

2-4 Cf. my artide Tlte Second Vatican Council's Psychology oj Personal and

Social Li/e, Studia l,foralia IV (1966), pp. 167-191, republished as Psychologie de la

t•ié persomzelle et sociale selon le Second Conr.ile du Vatic-an in J. DE LA TORRE et al.,

Égli.se et Co-mmunau.té Hu.maine (Paris, 1968), pp. l0i-131.

z:s The < newness > of Christian !ife that must ever be renewed js a signific'1nt theme of < futurist > theology. < In the following pages we hope to present anew

to adults the message which Jesus of Nazareth brought into the wodd, to make it

sau.nd as new as it is > (De Nieu.we Ka.techismus, English trans . .4. New Catechism

(L-Ondon, 1967], p. V: Foreword of the Bishops of the Xetherlands: i tal ics mine). This corresponds on the theological plane to the < newness > or < revolution > of

life that < existential > hope holds itself < ready > for (cf. E; FROM�, Th.e Revoluti.on o/ Hop6 [New York, 1968]).

55

hope. It must reckon with man's rootedness in nature, history

and 'presentiality .. precisely in order to offer him a truìy human

'future', and at the same time it must never become so tied to

nature, history and 'presentiality' as to fail in its essmtial task

of offering man a saving 'future' to which he can respond in saving

hope.

Rome, Academia Alfonsiana